Day 247: Zechariah 7–8 | Read The Bible In A Year | Bible Study with Commentary by Dr. Manny Arango Day 247: Zechariah 7–8 | Read The Bible In A Year | Bible Study with Commentary by Dr. Manny Arango

Hey Bible nerds, this is Dr. Manny Arango. Welcome to the Bible Department podcast powered by ARMA. We are walking through the entire Bible in a year. You can go to the description or thebibledepartment.com to download a reading plan and join the journey. Family, welcome to day 247. We are continuing our trek through the book of Zechariah. We're in Zechariah today chapters 7 and 8, just two short chapters. If you've already done the reading then you're gonna have tons of context for everything that we are gonna talk about in this episode. But if you have not done the reading, you're gonna maybe want to stop the video, pause the audio, go do the reading. Seriously, you can get it done really, really, really quickly. It's just not a ton of reading. The chapters aren't very long. You can get all the reading done in a couple of minutes. So without further ado, let's jump into Zechariah chapters 7 and 8. Like always, I'm gonna give you context. Then we're gonna break down as many nerdy nuggets as we have time for and I'll always leave us off with a timeless truth. That's how we close every episode. Alright, let's dive into the context clues of Zechariah chapters 7 and 8. The context of these next oracles are almost two years later than the previous ones. So for Zechariah chapters 1 through 6, we have had the exact same context for all six chapters, but now we are two years into the future. Chapter 7 verse 1 tells us that these oracles take place on the fourth day, the ninth month of the fourth year of Darius I, which translates into December 7th, 518 BC. Okay, 518 BC. This means that by this time the temple is not only rebuilt, but has settled, that the Jewish people have settled into everyday routines. Of the Jewish religion. Okay, so sacrifices, feasts, etc. have now all been set up and followed. The ritual life of the Jewish people has therefore returned to normal. Okay, things have returned to normal. And also, maybe there's this lingering question in your mind, which is, why in the world do the people wait so long to rebuild the temple? Well, it's because they've been in exile and the entire time they've been in exile, they haven't had access to a temple. Okay, the exile of the people of Israel to Babylon permanently changes Judaism forever. All right, so in exile, they don't have a temple. But what do they have? They have the Torah. And so the Jewish religion becomes a religion centered around the book instead of a religion centered around animal sacrifices.

And so for 70 years, they can't practice animal sacrifices. So they become, their worship, their ritual life, their religion really begins to center around the meditation and the teaching of the book of the law, of the Word of God. This is where synagogues are gonna come from. Okay, synagogues today, like even today, if you go to a synagogue today, it's a place where you can learn Torah, learn instruction from a rabbi. So prior to exile, there are no rabbis. The focus is not teaching. You got prophets and you got priests prior to exile, and you're gonna have both of those after exile as well. But exile is gonna force Judaism to morph, to evolve. It's gonna evolve into a book. It's not gonna evolve into a book. It's gonna evolve into a religion that's centered around a book as opposed to a religion that's centered around animal sacrifice. So, all right, the reason that the people, you know, are kind of taking their time to rebuild the temple, it's because they haven't had one. They haven't had one for 70 years. So they come back into the land and they take a 16-year break in building the thing and Haggai and Zechariah gotta, you know, get them motivated to build because, yeah, it's just building. The temple is not a priority because they've already gone 70 years without one. Okay? And so now they're back in the land and they need to hear from the prophets. No, this is a priority. Do not delay. I know that you've been in Babylon for 70 years without a temple, but God needs you to build the temple. Okay? All right. So that's all the context that we really need and I thought that was a loose, maybe a loose strand from some previous days and I wanted to kind of just help with some understanding. All right. So let's dive into our nerdy nuggets. Okay, let's actually break down what's happening in chapter 7 and chapter 8. because it can be a little confusing, okay? Chapter seven, verse one, we'll just launch from chapter seven, verse one. It gives us the year, gives us the date. The word of the Lord came to Zechariah on the fourth day, ninth month, in the month of Kislev, okay? The people of Bethel had sent Sharezar and Regem-Melek together with their men to entreat the Lord

by asking the priests of the house of the Lord Almighty and the prophets. So here's the question, that big, long setup is for this, okay? The people are wondering, should I mourn and fast in the fifth month as I have done for so many years? That's it, simple. Zechariah could give a simple yay or nay, okay? Yes, you should. No, you shouldn't. That is not what happens. Yo, they're about to get hit with two chapters of an explanation as a response, and, you know, plot twist, Zechariah don't answer the question, okay? Spoiler alert, Zechariah does not answer. He never answers the question. Now, he says a bunch of things so that they could figure out an answer, but he doesn't actually give a direct answer. So that's the thing. They wanna know, should we keep fasting? Now, maybe you're wondering, why were they fasting in the first place? Like, what was this fasting? All right, so they're actually, the full list of the fasts are gonna get given in chapter eight, verse 19, but I'll just go ahead and tell you

there are four fasts, okay? There was one in the fourth month, one in the fifth month, one in the seventh month, and one in the 10th month. So month four, five, seven, and 10, there were fasts associated with those months. So what's going on here? They're fasting as a way to mourn the destruction of Jerusalem and the destruction of the temple. And so essentially they're saying, the temple is no longer destroyed. We rebuilt it. We're back from exile. We were kind of fasting because, you know, we were in exile. We're fasting because we were mourning the destruction of Israel and Jerusalem and the temple. And it seems like it's fixed now. Should we keep on doing these fasts? That's what they're wondering. Together, these fasts, I wanna even break down more like understanding. These fasts told the story of the fall of Jerusalem, okay, based on the months. So the 10th month is when the siege began. You can find this in 2 Kings 25, one. The fourth month is when the wall was breached. You can find this in Jeremiah 52, verses six to 11.

The fifth month is when the temple was destroyed. You can see this in 2 Kings 25, verses eight through 11. And the seventh month is when Gedoliah was assassinated. You can find this in Jeremiah 41, verses one through 11. So again, month four, five, seven, and 10, each of these months are actually commemorating a stage in the process of the destruction of Jerusalem, the destruction of Israel and the exile of the people. And so they're fasting on months four, five, seven, and 10 almost as a retelling, as a narrative retelling of the story of the exile. And for anyone who's never heard this before, fasting is a way to mourn. Jesus actually says this in the New Testament. He says, oh, you know, you should rejoice now because you have the bridegroom with you. There's gonna be a day where you'll fast and you're gonna mourn because I'm no longer with you. So fasting and mourning is actually linked. You can see that here. They're mourning, they're grieving because they've lost the temple, Jerusalem. They're going into exile, so they are fasting to commemorate the fall or to mourn the fall, the destruction of Jerusalem. And so now that, you know, Jerusalem is getting rebuilt and the temple is getting restored and the exiles are back, they just got the natural question. Hey, should we keep doing, should we keep fasting? Or like, are we still mourning?

Like, hey, Zechariah, what's going on? And man, whew, they triggered the prophet, man. They didn't know, they didn't realize. So verse five, the word of the Lord Almighty came to me. Then verse five, ask all the people in the land and the priests, when you fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months for the past 70 years. They've been doing this for 70 years. Was it really for me that you fasted? Oh boy, and when you were eating and drinking, were you not just feasting for yourselves? Okay, so the rhythm has been feasting and fasting, feasting and fasting. Are these not the words the Lord proclaimed through earlier prophets when Jerusalem and its surrounding towns were at rest and prosperous and the Negev and the Western foothills were settled. Okay, they now Whoo does not I mean the the question has really triggered Zechariah and here we go verse 11. Sorry verse 8 and the Word of the Lord came to Zechariah This is what the Lord Almighty said Administer true justice show mercy and compassion one another do not oppress the widow or the fatherless The foreigner or the poor do not plot evil against each other brah. All we did was ask you about fasting We didn't ask you about fasting bro, how we get a sermon we just asked you a simple yes or no question man Should we be fasted? Should we keep fasted? I guess it's a good bad What should we do Zechariah's like administer true justice, bro. We didn't ask you about justice We didn't ask you that about justice administer true justice show mercy and compassion one another Do not oppress the widow or the fatherless the foreigner or the poor do not plot evil against each other Okay, drop down to verse 13 Actually, you just drop all the way down to chapter 8. Okay, this is gonna keep going for two chapters chapter 8 verse 6 This is what the Lord Almighty says it may seem marvelous to the remnant of this people at that time But will it seem marvelous to me declares the Lord Almighty keep going verse 16 of chapter 8

These are the things that you are to do speak the truth to each other and render true and sound judgment in your courts Do not plot evil against each other and do not love to swear falsely I hate all this declares the Lord the Word of the Lord Almighty came to me verse 19 This is what the Lord Almighty says the fast of the fourth fifth seventh and ten months Will become joyful and glad occasions and happy festivals for Judah therefore love truth and peace and I mean and then it keeps going on and on and on and on and on and Who the ant the question never gets answered? I don't know if you ever had like a pastor like that that you like ask them a question and it Triggered something in them and they just started going off about something that seemed totally unrelated. This is one of those moments however it's actually not unrelated and The key here is the question that Yahweh asks right up at the top and that's Zechariah chapter 7 verse 5 Here's the question This is also setting us up for Jesus in the New Testament because he's really gonna answer questions He's gonna ask more questions. He's gonna respond to a question with the question. Okay, so Zechariah chapter 7 verse 5 Okay, the people have asked Zechariah should we keep fasting or not? We've been doing this for 70 years It seems like it's no longer relevant. You know, I'm saying can we stop Zechariah? Zechariah chapter 7 verse 5 was it really for me that you fasted? That's God's question Was it really for me? Because if it was then that is gonna actually give you the answer that you need. Was it really for me? Did you did you actually fast for me or did you fast as a way to cope with your own? Feelings. Did you were you fasting for me or were you fasting for your own mental and emotional health? Were you was it for me? Was it worship? Because here's how I know if it's worship I know if it's worship if it causes you to treat other people Who bear my image with honor and dignity and respect? that's like the teacher of the law saying Lord, you know, I follow the commands and Jesus saying what are all the commands what the greatest commands and he goes Oh love Lord your God with all your heart all your soul all your mind all your strength and love your neighbor as yourself And and the man of course has this Iconic question who's my neighbor and Jesus is like, oh, let's talk about that

Okay, because you can't say you love God and you don't love others You can't say you obey God and you don't obey others You can't say you honor God and you don't honor others And so God has a the key to unlocking this whole two chapters is did you do it for me? Was it really worship you do it with me in mind or did you do it out of ritual? Did you do it out of religion? Did you like did you do it for me? Was it really worship because if it was really worship then worship is always gonna cause you to act with the utmost amounts of love and Compassion and empathy and honor and respect and justice towards others Family, the wait is over. My brand new book crushing chaos is out now and available Everywhere books are sold Literally today I walked into a Barnes & Noble and I signed a bunch of copies at a physical location so you can grab this book at a physical Barnes & Noble or you can go to a books a million or Amazon or anywhere books are sold and grab a copy if you enjoy reading the bible from an ancient perspective if you understand that the beauty of scripture is actually knowing it in context then you'll love this book and if there's any chaos in your personal life i think that reading the bible from an ancient perspective can actually help to crush the chaos in your life i think this book is going to be a new york times bestseller i really do i think we wrote a good one i think you should get a copy today all right back to the episode and so look at the two things that god is gonna say okay let's go to chapter 7 chapter 7 verse 9 administer true justice i said that funny administer true justice show mercy and compassion to one another do not oppress the widow or the fatherless the foreigner or the poor do not plot evil against each other that's the way that god's gonna know if it was actually done for him is that you started treating widows and fatherless and the foreigner better and then go to chapter 8 chapter 8 verse 16 these are the things you ought to do speak the truth to each other and render true and sound judgment in your courts do not plot evil against each other and do not love to swear falsely i hate all this declares the lord i'll know whether or not it was really worship because worship is never just about you and god's personal relationship worship always encapsulates how we treat other people this is brilliant actually it's good it's like can be aggravating like when people don't just respond

to your question but the reason that rabbis and leaders in a eastern world or in the jewish world don't just respond to the question is because they're trying to respond to the question behind the question and the real question is the one posed by Yahweh oh tell me about your motives were you really fasting for me was it was it really unto the lord was it for me was it for y'all like what like why were you actually doing this and then god actually says hey verse 19 this is what the lord almighty says those fasts that happen in the fourth fifth seventh and ten months will become joyful they'll become joyful because the relationship with god is not designed to be endured it's designed to be enjoyed will become joyful and glad occasions and happy festivals for judah wait a second how in the world can a fast also be a festival those are actually total complete polar opposites and god says because when you really fast it creates heart transformation and when your heart's transformed not really about whether or not you're fasting or feasting because both are actually worship the feasts are designed to be worshiped the fasting is designed to be worshiped and whether you're fasting or feasting it's going to create joy and gladness and and it's going to create happiness therefore love truth and peace because the reality of the situation is god's not concerned with fasting or festivals he's concerned with the transformation of the human heart and when your human heart actually begins to transform you no longer need the tool that was transforming it feasting is just a tool to transform your heart fasting is a tool to transform your heart and god says my goal is to transform your heart and the way that i'll know that your heart is transformed is that the fruit will be in how you treat other people and i don't know i don't know whether or not you were doing it for me because you'll love truth and you'll love peace this is profound and this leads effortlessly into our timeless truth you know i ask myself the question all the time are we recording these episodes for the lord like like is this for god man do we record courses on the armor platform do we do that for god and our preaching our singing our work like is it for the lord is it really for the lord because it's so easy to start doing things for motives that just have nothing to do with really pleasing god and that's not just a challenge for zechariah's day that's not just a challenge in 518 bc that's real for us right now it's so easy for us to do things that on the surface looks like it's for god but really when you start to dig you're doing it for all kinds of motives and here's the reality nobody knows your motives but you and god like i can't look at you and say hey you're praying for the wrong motive or you're fasting for the wrong motive or you're going to church for

the wrong motive you know the motive of your heart and here's the reality sometimes our motive gets revealed when the thing we were doing it for doesn't happen. So if I'm fasting so that me and my wife can get pregnant and we never get pregnant, now I resent the fact that I was fasting. And now I got fasting has left a bitter taste in my mouth. Or if I was fasting because my pastor told me to, now fasting is something I don't want to do. And I think we need to like ask, like, especially with spiritual disciplines that we've been turned off by, well, what was the intention? Was it for the Lord? Or was it just because it's January and that's when Christians fast? Like, why did you do it? Did you do it to try to spiritually manipulate God into blessing you? Like, why did you do it? And if the answer is, I did it for the Lord, then the fruit of that is inner transformation. Like your heart begins to change and there's love that begins to overflow out of your heart and spills over to your human relationships. And that's not just true for Zechariah. That's true for you. That's true for me. That's a timeless truth. All right, tomorrow we've got day 248.

We're gonna get into the wackiest, weirdest, strangest, oddest part of the book of Zechariah. We're gonna really dive into some apocalyptic vision content. And so that starts tomorrow. Super excited about it. How about you meet me right here for day 248? It's gonna be awesome. We're gonna continue our trek, the book of Zechariah. I'll see you tomorrow right here for day 248. Love you, peace. Thanks so much for joining us on the Bible Department podcast. If this episode was helpful, how about you leave a comment, share with a friend, and subscribe so that you never miss an episode. To learn more about the show, head to thebibledepartment.com. We'll see you right back here tomorrow.